Our Mission: Power A Clean Future Ohio is building momentum now for a clean, prosperous future by equipping local leaders for equitable, community-driven carbon reductions in Ohio. |
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Local Action Update:
PCFO Celebrates Major Milestone and Welcomes New Communities
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Power A Clean Future Ohio has reached several milestones over the past couple of weeks. Two new communities joined, and we can now say one in three Ohioans live in a PCFO Community!
Cuyahoga County Became 29th Community to Join PCFO
With the approval of Executive Armond Budish and Director of Sustainability Mike Foley, Cuyahoga County has joined Power a Clean Future Ohio, furthering the County’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions across the communities it serves. PCFO will work with local leaders to provide technical assistance and partnerships to help County staff as they continue to work toward the established goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Cuyahoga County by 45% from 2010 levels by 2030 and 100% by 2050. Cuyahoga County is now the third county to join Power a Clean Future Ohio. “Our partnership with Power a Clean Future Ohio will help us to deepen our sustainable initiatives. It will help promote economic development and encourage environmentally-friendly efforts that secure a better future for our citizens,” said Mike Foley, Director of Sustainability of Cuyahoga County.
Valerie Katz, Deputy Director of Sustainability for Cuyahoga County said, “The coalition of advocates and policy experts available through Power a Clean Future Ohio offer Cuyahoga County great support, tools, and resources that will advance our sustainability goals, and I look forward to working with them. We also think we have an array of experiences, projects, and ingenuity that can assist PCFO as it works with other communities.” Counties like Cuyahoga County are making a commitment to spur the economic growth and development that results from embracing clean technologies and advanced transportation.
The Village of Moreland Hills Became 30th Community to Join PCFO
At the Village of Moreland Hills Council meeting on Wednesday, May 11, council members unanimously adopted a resolution to join Power A Clean Future Ohio, underscoring the community’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and embracing clean energy opportunities to support their local economy and government services. PCFO will work with local leaders to provide technical assistance and partnerships to help staff as they develop a roadmap for the Village to reduce emissions and proactively seek input from the community in developing and promoting the plan. With the passage of this resolution, the Village of Moreland Hills became the 30th community to join Power A Clean Future Ohio.
Village of Moreland Hills Mayor Daniel Fritz said, “Local sustainability projects and inclusive planning are essential to accomplishing our long-term environmental, economic, and financial goals as a community. In our work with Power A Clean Future Ohio, we hope to identify the right investments that we can make that will protect our environment for the next generation and deploy a new wave of technologies that will improve our own operations and services as a government.”
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PCFO INFRASTRUCTURE GRANT SNAPSHOTS
Federal Funding: Find it here!
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This week, the White House released the recordings for a series of “Infrastructure School” webinars conducted between February and March 2022. These webinars provide a deeper look at funding opportunities created by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law under each major area of investment.
If you are unable to watch the recordings, visit the PCFO IGAP Webinar page to review notes from the BIL Guidebook Introduction, Electric Vehicles, Public Transportation, and Clean Energy and Power webinars. These notes include information on the federal departments’ goals, funding opportunities, and available links to program pages.
If you are interested in applying or need PCFO’s support please contact Sarah Spence, IGAP Coordinator, at sarah@ohcef.org with any questions.
ALL of the grants listed below have due dates for applications, letters, or concept papers THIS MONTH.
The Department of Energy issued a Request for Information to gather feedback on the implementation of energy storage demonstration programs. These energy storage programs will provide the opportunity to accelerate commercialization for energy technologies by: (1) demonstrating the technologies at scale; and (2) partnering with community and industry stakeholders so they can best adopt and benefit from these technologies. PCFO has created an RFI Snapshot for partners that are interested in responding to this RFI. Comments are due on June 16, 2022.
RACER is a funding opportunity for projects that enable communities to utilize solar and solar-plus-storage to prevent disruptions in power caused by extreme weather and other events and to rapidly restore electricity if it goes down. Projects will foster engagement and ongoing communication among multiple stakeholders and will develop and demonstrate rapid energy restoration technologies based on the community resilience plan in order to increase the durability of photovoltaic (PV) systems.
The Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities Program makes federal resources available to states and direct recipients to replace, rehabilitate and purchase buses and related equipment and to construct bus-related facilities including technological changes or innovations to modify low or no emission vehicles or facilities. The Low or No EmissionGrant Program is a sub-program.
The Low or No Emission competitive program provides funding to state and local governmental authorities for the purchase or lease of zero-emission and low-emission transit buses as well as the acquisition, construction, and leasing of required supporting facilities.
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PCFO Sustainability Planning Cohort to Start in June 2022 |
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PCFO is excited to announce its inaugural Sustainability and Climate Action Planning Cohort! This free, six-month program is designed to support and assist PCFO communities in similar stages of the planning process.
PCFO communities will hear from technical experts and experienced peers on topics such as building the case for developing a plan; data collection, management and analysis; choosing your policy and program priorities and conducting equitable community engagement and outreach. If you are interested in signing up, please click here.
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Mapping Tools Help Ohio Cities Chart Course for Environmental Justice |
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Ohio cities are using new data mapping tools that will help identify and respond to disparities in energy burden, climate risks, and pollution impacts.
Community and government groups in the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati area have recently used a particularly robust tool called the Greenlink Equity Map (GEM) platform. This tool lets users see the intersections among roughly three dozen demographic, economic, and environmental factors. Therefore, people can see where folks are most impacted with issues like paying utility bills, asthma cases, evictions and other factors that affect people of color and worsen their risks for harm from climate change. “Those issues are especially timely as local areas seek federal infrastructure funds,” said Jellie Duckworth, GEM strategic development manager at Greenlink Analytics. The GEM ends up being a full service tool that allows people to see the overlay and intersection of all these different aspects that occur in the city.
To read more about this article, click here.
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2022 Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit
June 16, 2022, 8 a.m. - 6 p.m., Cintas Center, Xavier University
Each year, the Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit brings together hundreds of passionate business, nonprofit, government and community leaders to share inspiring forward-thinking and solution-oriented ideas that propel us toward a healthier, more resilient, sustainable and equitable future. Relevant topics like healthy & resilient communities, business & green, circular economy, government & policy, and more will be discussed. To learn more and register, click here.
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Interested in getting started? Join today! |
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PCFO is an expansive, diverse coalition engaging with cities and local governments across the state of Ohio to build a clean future for our communities. Power A Clean Future Ohio is empowering local leaders with tools and resources to create carbon reduction plans and implement them in ways that are achievable, measurable, equitable and economical.
Our coalition of expert organizations wants to share our technical expertise and resources with your community. If your community wants to work on plans to reduce emissions, attract business investment, implement equitable clean energy policy, and reduce costs – contact us today to set up a meeting!
If your business or organization would like to support PCFO, we invite you to join the campaign as a PCFO Partner. Contact us for more details.
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